The key to successful photos :-)

One question that keeps popping up now and again in the comments of my Picasa Web Album is something like "how do you do this?" - and of course I know that the question is somewhat hypothetical, and I know its sometimes just flattery too, but well, I am flattered of course.

So, the simple answer to this question, in other words (repeating the somewhat bold statement of this posts title) the key to successful photos is: Being there & knowing what to do.


Backlit Fern II

I already showed the landscape orientation of this photo in the recently added album "Fern & Forest" but the version with portrait orientation is clearly my favorite.

So, part one of my philosophy: Being there. Its so obvious, do I have to explain it? :-) Well, I found out that working with the light is indeed an important factor, so you have to be there at the right time. I was there in the forest in the early afternoon, because the sun was high and I knew I'd get a lot of backlit leaves that way (but this also means a huge dynamic range of course, especially in the forest).

Part two is knowing what to do, and of course this means mainly all the technical aspects. I'm not going into every detail now of course (after all, it took me something like 2 1/2 years to be where I am now in terms of "controlling the camera" - instead of letting the camera control me). I'll just explain what I found out over time with the above example photo.

In lighting situation like the above, you just have to know how the metering of your camera behaves - and if you maybe have to use some exposure compensation to get a really good exposure (the only adjustment in the photo above is some fill light and clarity). Only using the camera regularly will result in the knowledge and experience how and what it will do in which situation. Its so helpful to use a digital camera: just check the display, the histogram, the highlight (clip) warning, and make the same photo again with small adjustment if the result isn't what you expected.

I want to stress that I do think that despite all the post processing possibilities we have, a good exposure can't be beaten by post processing (at least IMHO). Its not possible to salvage blown out highlights from an overexposed photo with post processing, and adjusting the exposure of an underexposed photo will result in more noise and grain than necessary.

The vivid green in the photo above is of course the result of using a polarizing filter. The sparse light through the trees in the forest on a sunny day will create a lot of reflections that would result in completely blown out, white overexposed parts on leaves etc. - to remove these reflections, the polarizer is (as usual) the nature/landscape photographers best friend. :-)

But the polarizer costs light and requires longer exposure times (usually something in the range of 2 to 4 stops). In the scene above it meant for me that it would have been impossible to safely make a handheld photo. So I used the tripod (my new best friend, not just in terms of getting sharp photos, but also because its such a great add when it comes to framing and composition).

At ISO100, the resulting exposure time of 1/8s at f/8 is in the critical region where the movement of the mirror alone will cause enough camera shake to ruin the photo - and the solution is of course a cable release. Manually releasing the mirror, waiting some seconds and then opening the shutter gave me the above result (oh, and I was lucky that there was no wind that moment of course).

So, thats how I do it. I don't know how to use a flash properly. But I do know the things I need to know to be in control of the camera technique for "my" kind of photography, and being in control of the camera leaves my head clear for the creative part of photography.